I’m not going to deny that some people enjoy going to work and enjoy interacting with their coworkers, but this feels like it’s missing the forest for the trees. What about the affects commuting has on one’s civic engagement in their actual community?
“There’s a simple rule of thumb: Every ten minutes of commuting results in ten per cent fewer social connections. Commuting is connected to social isolation, which causes unhappiness.” https://archive.ph/2020.02.27-211238/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/04/16/there-and-back-again
I’ve always thought that researchers should plot outcomes against commute times.
I broadly agree, but I think there’s a bit of a “correlation is not causation” effect at play, too
I would expect people who are very career-focused would prioritise socialising less, and also be more willing to do a long commute for a job they are highly invested in. But the reduced socialising wouldn’t necessarily be caused by the commuting (not entirely, at least).
41 year old male, no kids, no wife or girlfriend, been work from home for 5 years now. I’ve never been happier and more productive.
I get my sense of community from my friends not my coworkers. This study is B.S.
I’ll concur - same stats as you too.
You know there are always outliers because research often looks at populations in general and not the exact experience of a specific person. Unless it’s a case study but that’s different.
Either way that’s a really good thing for you, the modern world makes it difficult to make and keep close to friends.
True, and I was drawing on anecdotal evidence that I didn’t elaborate on in my original comment. While I know there are people who do not do well or enjoy work from home, I have yet to meet those people, all my coworkers and friend group are loving work from home.
So a more accurate statement would have been, based on my personal experience along with with coworkers and my friend circle this study is B.S.
I was and am in a situation where WFM became voluntary because we outgrew the space while everyone was at home.
We have no limit of volunteers to work in the office, we have multiple people who never left the office, they continued to commute and went in every day.
So my anecdotal experience is the exact opposite of yours, which is why we don’t put a ton of stock in them and look at aggregates in studies. Making sense?
Tbf there’s definitely some confirmation bias in there because a person who didn’t enjoy being remote probably wouldn’t seek that type of job
Yeah, you gotta have friends that are close by and you can get out with or they can come over. If you don’t… Sometimes it feels lonely. But to be honest, you kinda get used to it.
Just because you have anecdotal evidence of the contrary doesn’t mean it can’t be true, quantitatively. I, too, am a childless man - although I do have a wife - and don’t resonate with this, but that doesn’t mean I’ll just cast aside the findings. Many, especially young, men are unhappy in their everyday, partly due to a lack of sense od community in the “modern” world.
Best thing about working from home is stepping away from my desk, popping upstairs, and tossing my little baby boy up in the air a few times while he giggles and smiles.
me with my dog
me with my snake
Childless man here, I work mostly remotely.
I don’t miss any sense of community.
Same. I came here to make the exact same comment.
Let’s fix this headline:
Remote work benefits all in different ways.
Oh c’mon the headline is clear. Get pregante XOR go home!
Same, but I do have my own community away from work and have always prioritized my friends over co-workers.
Same. What an asanine thing for the article to assert.
Agreed. This article sounds like the kind of BS corporate media’s trying to parrot to gaslight us into giving up WFH.
What community? Getting whipped along with your work colleagues? I swear these studies are totally sponsored by some business interests.
Same. I’ve always hated office culture and don’t miss it one bit.
I know this a gross oversimplification, but:
“Remote working benefit those with a reason to stay home, but doesn’t for those who don’t have a reason to stay home” seems to be the general idea of the headline.
oh yea heard this question asked in reddit on multiple instances, the ones that dont stay at home tend to waste time at watercooler chat, gossip,etc, not productive work, just that interaction they cant live without.
This was also my experience during the main sweep of the pandemic. It was so great getting to cut the commute and be home. Something I have luckily managed to largely continue. Prior to the pandemic my kid was in daycare pretty much 7:30-5:30 so it was really nice to not have to do that, plus during our lockdown we used to go for a family walk at lunchtime.
While some of the single guys I worked with hated staying home and were straight back in the office the moment they were allowed.
I think it’s funny that I had the opposite experience. My coworkers who had kids couldn’t wait to get back to the office, while the few of us youngsters who didn’t wanted nothing but to keep working remotely. Probably why those few of us left immediately when it became clear they were going to force everyone back.
probably because they dont want to deal with thier kids 24/7, screaming,c rying,etc.
Yeah I went 3 months without having a single face to face conversation with someone, it was pretty shit even with online gaming and discord.
That sounds amazing
Pretty much. It’s feels like someone complaining that they won the lottery.
Not everyones ideal life is to at all times be alone.
So they ruin it for everyone else.
During the pandemic my partner stayed inside for about a month, I was the only person she interacted with. I kept going to work because I was an “essential” worker (not really), so I kinda envied her, but by the end of that month she was going a bit crazy.
Can’t wait until we figure out that improving society for the people in it, improves society overall.
Stop the fuck with “sense of community” and other crap.
I’m starting to understand that many people never felt the sense of community, in the workplace or otherwise. Yes it’s possible.
The trick is that it doesn’t depend on the company, it depends on the people. Last time it happened to me, we pretty much all quit together because we were frustrated at the company but kept being friends afterwards.
after studying mostly from home for 3 years, I’m very happy to be working on-site. feels a lot less lonely.
Not everyone hates life like you do. I hang out with co-workers all the time. Kept relationships will after I’m done.
Not everyone hates life like you do
🙄
🤷♂️ I can make friends at work just fine
Well if YOU can, that’s all that matters.
What does this even mean 🤣?
You’re mad at me because I’m an enjoyable person who gets along with co workers now? Are you saying I should feel sorry for people that can’t make friends outside the Internet? I’m genuinely confused at what your point is here.
What does this even mean
Read again. Slowly.
Maybe they used the wrong language. You roll your eyes, so you don’t hate life, heard.
So then why, genuinely, do you reject the idea of community with such conviction?
Not everyone hates life like you do
Work isn’t life.
It’s the opposite of life (no, death is just its absence).
hang out with co-workers all the time
Bonding over shared trauma and Stockholm syndrome is not a good basis for a relationship (though there’s probably no relationship other than you pestering them while they try to work).
Come on, work being the sole source of community is the problem here. What are we even talking about?
A lack of non alcoholic third spaces is what I would like to talk about.
No one said “sole.” It’s about a sense of community between you and your coworkers, which is a very real and normal thing. It’s spelled out in the article very clearly:
losing that sense of workplace community had a greater impact on childless men
“Workplace community.”
I’m a dad working remote and I love the benefits but I ALSO miss the sense of community with my coworkers which I used to get from lunches together, sharing the train ride home, or just working side by side at our desks.
sense of community between you and your coworkers, which is a very real and normal thing
No it fucking ain’t.
Forcing people together doesn’t create community, it creates stress, and resentment, and burnout, and migraines.
“Workplace community.”
Biggest oxymoron I’ve ever seen since military intelligence.
ALSO miss the sense of community with my coworkers which I used to get from lunches together, sharing the train ride home, or just working side by side at our desks
Oh, you’re one of those fucking extroverts.
I can’t begin to imagine the extent to which your poor coworkers must have despised you while you constantly bothered them while they tried to work, or have a quick decompressing lunch, or disconnect after a long day of work during the train ride home, the poor bastards. As if work wasn’t bad enough by itself.
No it fucking ain’t.
Well, that settles it. Who can argue with this kind of airtight logic?
Your post is unnecessarily hostile and offers nothing, son. I’ve worked at the same place for 8 years now, probably longer than you’ve been out of diapers, and yes, working alongside people does form a bond. If you’ve ever had to cooperate with someone, trust someone, get through difficulties with someone, you’d know all this. But from the way you enjoy flinging obscenities at strangers I doubt you have much experience forming bonds with people, period.
Oh, you’re one of those fucking extroverts.
And here’s the part where I just laugh in your face.
Imagine being this vitriolic in response to someone’s personal anecdote.
The person you responded to said they did find a sense of community like the study describes. Nowhere in there did they argue that anyone should be forced to go back to an office nor even that an office spot be made available to people.
if you hear the shit coworkers talk behind peoples back, you really dont want to interact with them most of the time, its just to save face by being nice, eventhough coworkers might not want to talk to you, someone like op might be annoying to them for whatever reason.
hmm, so having or not having kids have impact on your sence of workplace community during remote work?
Does it add up to you?
Try reformulating your question in English and I’ll see if I can answer you.
I like to think I would less judgmental about people attepting to communicate with me in the only language I know. Maybe approach like that is the reason work is the only place where people spent time with you ;)
Your comment was unintelligible, sorry. I can hear you whining now, very clearly, and trying to insult me personally. So I guess you can communicate successfully when you try.
I’m glad you understood me know, thank you. I adapted your approach to learning languages - speaking slow and laudly. It worked like a charm.
Yes, but it’s also the most logical place. What other activity do you dedicate so much time to? Maybe sleeping but it’s hard to build a community around that.
It would be logical to work less and get our own community. A lot of people work hard all their lives and die soon after retirement. That’s not logical.
Quality over quantity.
Great places to socialize are sports-clubs, social-clubs, volunteering, activism, religious communities…
I’d much rather spend five hours a week distributed over two or three occasions with people i share interests with, than with people i share work with. Meanwhile at work i am mostly engaged in small talk, that is quite repetitive as i see the people every day and i have to guard what i can say and what i cannot say more than in other circles.
According to my kids, candies are the most logical place to get most your nutritions from. Where else could you get so many calories?
If most of your time at work is spent socializing, couldn’t you cut your work time and build your community elsewhere?
If most of your time at work you spent on honest hard-work working, how much community are you really building?
Cut you calories. Life doesn’t happen at work.
Eh, I became a stay at home mom over the pandemic, and while I’ve never worked in an office, but on the shop floor, I do miss the shenanigans. But its almost like a trauma bond, where its like, hey, we’re all stuck here, best make the nest of it and try snd have fun while we are here.
I’m fully isolated now, and at this point terrified of crowds, when i never was before.
Not arguing at all people who can work remotely shouldn’t, they should, for a litter or reasons. But I do miss my coworkers from my employee owned factory where culture was held in high standard. Im also not arguing this should be the only place one finds community, I’m only saying, for a person like me, it helped sometimes to joke around on the new guy or collectively bitch about issues at work or hear other folks problems and offer advice or help when I could.
We socialized outside of work too. I can’t get invited to a party, or a wedding, or anything if I literally don’t know anyone. I’ve only ever known how to make friends in structured environments. But that’s wierdo me.
No, I think that’s the fair take. But to me, it’s similar when people say “Studies may teach me a thing, but I’m glad I went there because I met all this people”… Yes, you spent X years there. You’d probably bound with someone over that time if it was a different place as well. It’s perfectly understandable to have a need for structure. I just wish that work isnt that sole source of structure in most people live.
Being back mandatory poker nights!!!
romcom idea: childless man has crush on childed man. he’s raring to come back to work to hang out with hot dad man, but the latter is forced to work remotely.
the whole plot swivels around how they get around the lack of opportunities to be together.
keep cooking
Oh, yes! I sure do miss that community made up of ass kissers and people who are just as miserable as I am! Or those 2-3 chill people with whom I meet for a chat weekly anyway, outside work hours because I sure as hell ain’t in the mood for socialising while I’m wasting (at least) a third of my day and life doing busiwork for someone else!
i’m skeptical of any study that concludes anyone would rather deal with all the bullshit of working in the office rather than wfh
no one goes to work for the “community,” which can also be gotten literally anywhere other than work
sounds like something corporate slavedriving senior executives decided they wanted a “study” on to prove people want to work in the office
no one goes to work for the “community,” which can also be gotten literally anywhere other than work
I can confidently say that a lot of my coworkers do go to work for a sense of community and also hang out with those same coworkers after hours. They basically get to see their community at work, and most of them don’t have a home office set up, so the office is a better setting for them.
I separate work and home life almost entirely, and love working from home, but do want to acknowledge that some people do want to be in the office and it isn’t only the toxic ones.
which can also be gotten literally anywhere other than work
Can it? For absolutely everyone, regardless of (mental) health? No one benefits from being monetarily pressured to interact with people even if the interaction is only surface level?
ok. the reasons someone might actually want to go to work in the office (e.g., can’t interact with people who aren’t getting paid to interact) are not the same reasons CEOs want to force you to work in the office (control; oversight; subjugation)
It’s not about remote vs office work, but working remotely all the time reminds particularly painfully about not having a SO or many friends. When working from office, covertly texting a good acquaintance 2-3 times a day kinda replaces that. When at home, you could do much more of that, or probably bunch together to work, but you don’t. Just sit there, smell your socks, sip tea, get distracted for nothing good, and feel how your life passes into abyss. When in office, you at least have the stress of many loud people around to distract you from that.
When in office, you at least have the stress of many loud people around to distract you from that.
You hear yourself and you can spot the issue, right?
Dude you need to up your life a bit. Dontchathink?
I’m childless and all I can say is fuck community.
Dude what? It was a great show!
I’m sorry to hear this. What makes you say this?
They’re not distinguishing “remote work” from “working from home” which are two entirely different things. There are whole communities of remote workers who meet and work together around the world. I guarantee you that remote working men who take advantage of these kinds of environments have a better sense of community than men who are forced to go sit in a cubicle with a group of people like the cast of The Office with less sense of humor.
In office, I’m a chatty bitch. I have a habit of maybe over-socializing. For sure, my productivity goes down in the office. Oh, and people listen to me just as much WFH as they did in the office when it comes to work stuff.
At home, I can just turn on some music and focus on what I need to get done. I can work on my 20+ jira points I have every god damn sprint. Meetings (ad-hoc or planned) already cause delays for me and I’m already working to much (the highest so far, has been a 16-hour day).
I don’t miss the ‘sense of community’ because there isn’t one. Plus, most of my co-workers live in different states, and many in different countries. There’s no in-person collaboration even if I’m in the office. It’s still everything done over chat/video call.
My company, like so many others, went back on everything they said about WFH. They used to say how great it was because they could find talent from anywhere instead of being arbitrarily constrained by location. Like, obviously, the best talent doesn’t just happen to live next to you. Then it moved to hybrid, for those all important in-person, face-to-face collabs and synergy and all the other bullshit LinkedIn BS you can spew. And now, they’re doing RTO full on and even shaming those who work from home or would want to. Full-on bully tactics in meetings too. Even started shaming the upper mgmt, because their excuse was “well, other companies are doing it” so I hit back with the “if other companies were committing fraud, would we?” a spin on the “well if everyone else was jumping off a bridge, would you” I grew up hearing all the time. I actually brought that up in a corporate meeting, they never responded, so I’m taking that as a yes… yes they would and will, so long as they figure they can get away with it (or the penalties don’t outweigh the profits).
And then I find out Tim Walz (Minnesota Governor) is also for RTO… so I emailed his office, letting him know just how utterly disappointed in him I was, and to not expect my vote ever again.
Sorry, I’ll get off my soapbox. I’m just truly passionate about this. WFH, I’m far less miserable on a day-to-day basis. Working in the office, I was in multiple car accidents going to and from work (none of which I caused). I’ve been in exactly 0 since WFH. No longer spending 1-2 hours a day just traveling, so I can work remotely, in an office. If I ever win the lotto, I’ll be rich enough I could run for president and one of my pillars would be pushing businesses to utilize WFH if the position can do that. Fewer cars on roads, means less congestion for those who have to be onsite. There should be a noticeable decrease in vehicle-related accidents and fatalities.
Ownership will abuse labor as much as it can. Sometimes to make more profit. Sometimes for murkier reasons. I think some management are just stupid and they’d hurt the company to follow their unfounded feelings.
Labor should organize.
